Lost Communities of Chicago - Hyde Park Township.

Hyde Park Township was founded by Paul Cornell, a real-estate speculator and cousin of Cornell University founder Ezra Cornell. He paid for a topographical survey of the lakefront south of the city in 1852.

Paul Cornell, the founder of Hyde Park.

In 1853, following the advice of Senator Stephen Douglas, he bought 300 acres of speculative property between 51st Street and 55th Street. Cornell successfully negotiated land in exchange for a railroad station at 53rd Street setting in motion the development of the first Chicago railroad suburb. This area was 7 miles south of the mouth of the Chicago River and 6 miles south of downtown Chicago. In the 1850s, Chicago was still a walkable urban area well contained within a 2 miles radius of the center. 

He selected the name Hyde Park to associate the area with the elite neighborhood of Hyde Park in New York as well as the famous royal park in London. Hyde Park quickly became a popular suburban retreat for affluent Chicagoans who wanted to escape the noise and congestion of the rapidly growing city. By 1855 he began acquiring large land tracts, which he would subdivide into lots for sale in the 1870s.

The Hyde Park House, an upscale hotel, was built on the shore of Lake Michigan near the 53rd Street railroad station in 1857. For two decades, the Hyde Park House served as a focal point of Hyde Park's social life. During this period, it was visited or lived in by many prominent guests, including Mary Todd Lincoln, who lived there with her children for two and a half months in the summer of 1865; shortly after her husband, Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. The Hyde Park House burned down in a fire in 1879. The Sisson Hotel was built on the site in 1918 and was eventually converted into a condominium building (the Hampton House which still stands).

Hyde Park House at 53rd Street and Lake Michigan, Chicago.

Hyde Park was incorporated in 1861 as an independent township (called Hyde Park Township). Its boundaries were Pershing Road (39th Street) on the north, 138th Street on the south, State Street on the west, and Lake Michigan and the Indiana state line on the east.

In 1837, the City of Chicago incorporated, and by the 1870s the surrounding townships had followed suit. After 1850, Cook County was divided into basic governmental entities, which were designated as townships as a result of the new Illinois Constitution. Illinois's permissive incorporation law empowered any community of 300 resident citizens to petition the Illinois legislature for incorporation as a municipality under a municipal charter with more extensive powers to provide services and tax local residents. Hyde Park Township was created by the Illinois General Assembly in 1861 within Cook County. This empowered the township to better govern the provision of services to its increasingly suburban residents.

Following the June 29, 1889 elections, several suburban townships voted to be annexed to the city, which offered better services, such as improved water supply, sewerage, and fire and police protection. Hyde Park Township, however, had installed new waterworks in 1883 just north of 87th Street. Nonetheless, the majority of township voters supported annexation. After annexation, the definition of Hyde Park as a Chicago neighborhood was restricted to the historic core of the former township, centered on Cornell's initial development between 51st and 55th streets near the lakefront.

Two years after Hyde Park was annexed to the city of Chicago (1891), the University of Chicago was established in Hyde Park through the philanthropy of John D. Rockefeller and the leadership of William Rainey Harper. The University of Chicago eventually grew into one of the world's most prestigious universities and is now associated with eighty-nine Nobel Prize laureates.

Hyde Park hosted the World's Columbian Exposition in 1893. The World's Columbian Exposition brought fame to the neighborhood, which gave rise to an inflow of new residents and spurred new development that gradually started transforming Hyde Park into a more urban area.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Lost Towns of Illinois - Benjaminville, Illinois.

Benjaminville was founded in 1856 when three Quaker families of Joseph Marot, Isaac Clement and Timothy Benjamin arrived in the area. A settlement followed and was closely tied to the Society of Friends and the local church. The town grew gradually. In 1859 the first Meeting House was erected for $1,000, and a burial ground was established soon after. Through the 1860s, a slow but steady stream of Quakers moved to the area.

Quakers The Religious Society of Friends.
The Benjaminville Friends Meeting House and Burial Ground.

In 1859 the first Meeting House was erected for $1,000, and a burial ground was established soon after. Through the 1860s, a slow but steady stream of Quakers moved to the area. In 1874 the Benjaminville Friends Meeting House was erected, the only structure still standing in the town of Benjaminville. Settlement continued through the 1870s, and Benjaminville became a social, political and religious hub for Friends from Illinois. An 1879 history of McLean County called Benjaminville "one of the strongest settlements of Friends that is to be found anywhere in the state."

The Benjaminville Friends Meeting House was exclusive to the members of the Society of Friends, who often took political stances on issues of the day. Among these were peace, Indian affairs, women's suffrage, and the evils of boxing, lotteries, and gambling.

Throughout the 19th century, Benjaminville was home to a distinct local community of considerable political importance. Benjaminville never grew very large though it did contain at least two churches besides the meeting house and a few shops. By 1870 the town's fate was sealed when the Lake Erie Railroad opted to bypass the town because of the elevation of its terrain. The local churches eventually moved closer to the new railroad, and the town's businesses shut down.

The cemetery was established soon after the original meeting house was built in 1859. Burial grounds were typical accompaniments to friends' meeting houses. While burial grounds were encouraged in the 1825 Quaker Rules of Discipline, the burial of non-Quakers in a Quaker cemetery was not. To satisfy this rule, burials at Benjaminville were separated into two sections to allow an area for non-Quakers. A newer section contains a mix of Quaker and non-Quaker descendants of those originally buried there.

Non-Quaker burials were initially confined to the northern section of the cemetery, the portion directly behind the meeting house. Members of the Society of Friends were buried in the middle part of the cemetery, today surrounded by a loop in the gravel road that traverses the site. The most recent burials are found in the southernmost section of the cemetery, furthest from the meeting house. The entire burial ground is approximately 160 by 200 ft, for a total area of 32,000 sq ft.

Burials are oriented east-west. The burial ground covers most of the site's land and is planted with grass and trees. The surrounding land is predominantly agricultural, but some nearby residences exist. To the east, there is a wind farm.

The village of Benjaminville was located near the present-day community of Holder, Illinois, east of the city of Bloomington. The town was founded on an elevated area of flat, treeless prairie. Today, much of the area is used as cropland. Near the site of Benjaminville is the present-day unincorporated community of Bentown, Illinois. The townsite lies in both Dawson Township and Oldtown Township.

In 1981 the only remaining structure, an old wagon shop, was destroyed by fire, leaving the meeting house as the last remnant of the town. The Benjaminville Friends Meeting House and its burial ground were listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places on December 13, 1983.

Illinois Historical Marker, erected May 12, 1995, reads: "Benjaminville was founded in the 1850s by Quaker farmers looking for rich prairie soil on which to grow their wheat. The Friends Meeting House, built in 1874, has changed little since then. The adjacent Burial Ground is divided into two sections: one for Quakers and a second for non-Quakers. When the expected Lake Erie Railroad went elsewhere, the town eventually died. The Meeting House and Burial Ground are all that remain of Benjaminville. The site was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984."

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.